As signature deadline approaches, where’s Eyman?

Ferry waiting lines in Mukilteo and Clinton are a clover patch for paid mercenaries and volunteers collecting signatures on initiative petitions, with drivers at times hit up to sign two measures by initiative promoter Tim Eyman.

Tim Eyman comes to Olympia bearing initiative petitions. He has been doing so since 1999 but Washington voters may have an Eyman-free November election.

On a recent Saturday, however, the only car-window cause was I-1329, a measure to limit money in politics.

Where’s Eyman? Rather, where are the paid signature-gatherers for this year’s initiative, I-1325, another one of his legislative “supermajority” quests?

“We can’t find any sign of him, and we’ve been looking all over the state,” said Andrew Villeneuve, executive director of the Northwest Progressive Institute, a net-roots activist group that has dedicated itself to opposing Eyman.

For the first time in eight years, added Villeneuve, Washington voters are likely to enjoy an “Eyman-free November” as they fill out ballots.

Eyman is still sending out mailings to “thousands of followers” including a missive Tuesday. “Everyone has from now until July 3 — 9 days — to donate and collect signatures,” it reads. “Please contribute TODAY so this initiative effort is a success.”

Eyman did not return phone messages on Tuesday. But a check of state Public Disclosure Commission records is revealing.

The main vehicle for Eyman initiatives, Voters Want More Choices, shows contributions of a modest $191,000. Expenditures total $166,000 for such stuff as “officers compensation” and “printing and mailing.” There is no big outlay to Citizen Solutions, the for-hire outfit that has fueled past Eyman campaigns.

The single most important funder of Eyman initiatives, Woodinville investment banker Michael Dunmire, died recently.

Eyman alienated business support with his last ballot measure, a 2013 initiative that would have given persons circulating initiative petitions virtually unlimited access to public buildings, and to the property of retail stores and shopping malls. It was buried by a 63-37 percent margin last November.

Eyman, a former Mukilteo watch salesman, has enjoyed not 15 minutes, but 15 years of fame — ever since he sponsored and passed a $30 car tab measure in 1999.

Eyman has won victories, notably in limiting property tax increases. But he has lost a succession of statewide transportation measures aimed at curtailing mass transit spending, limiting tolls and blocking light rail. He lost a key battle in 2009 with the defeat of an initiative to rigidly limit the growth of local, county and state government spending.

The Washington State Supreme Court struck the greatest blow to Eyman. It ruled unconstitutional measures that would require a two-thirds vote of each house of the Legislature to raise revenue, close corporate loopholes, or impose measures like the per-barrel tax feared by the state’s oil refiners.

This year’s attempt, I-1325, is aimed at pushing the Legislature to enact a state constitutional amendment that would require such “supermajorities.”

Eyman has shown an instinct for the limelight comparable to Cinderella’s stepsisters. He has relentlessly courted the media — the Associated Press was Eyman’s virtual press agent in his early years — and turned initiative promotion into a profitable business.

Eyman has proven to be a political cat with nine lives. But July 3 is fast approaching, he needs 246,372 valid voter signatures to make the ballot, and signature mercenaries are not approaching citizens in the usual places.